Residents of Marmarashen Block Yerevan-Artashat Road

In Marmarashen village of Ararat Province, a tense situation has arisen for over an hour. According to Shamshyan.com, the villagers have blocked the road from Marmarashen community to the nearby Mkhchyan village on the Yerevan-Artashat motorway as a form of protest.

They complain that a pig farm run by former Prosperous Armenia Party member Vahan Karapetyan, owner of the "Cherry" restaurant, has forced them to keep the doors and windows of nearly 400 residential houses closed in the summer heat due to the unbearable odor that permeates the area.

According to their statements, representatives from the Ararat regional administration have also come to perform inspections, and they have imposed a fine of 300,000 Armenian drams for not maintaining sanitary-hygienic standards, but this has not resolved the issue.

Reports indicate that police are negotiating with the villagers to reopen the road, but the locals remain unyielding. The local community leader Edward Hakobyan is also participating in the protest and has informed Ararat Province Governor Garik Sargsyan about the situation. Following this, Gaykaz Terteryan, head of the agriculture and environmental protection department, has arrived in the village on the governor's instructions.